You see why this is absolutely necessary, don't you? What if nothing is done and global warming... doesn't happen? What a disaster! But if disastrously extreme measures are taken and then global warming doesn't happen? What a great relief! It will be impossible to tell whether the solution worked or whether global warming just wasn't going to happen anyway. Win-win!

Same logic with the stimulus, that's why they had to pass it so quickly.

If they didn't pass anything and the economy got better on it's own, the stimulus would have been worthless and Krugman and Reich wouldn't be able to play their sad violins and say the stimulus was too small.

This win, win for Pelosi and Obama is a permanent lose, lose for every American not under the spout where the Wind-mill money comes out. This abominable non science fraud will also lose every last drop of confidence that foreign investors have in a safe American fiscal system to invest their money in. Acting on lies, as obvious as this one is, as our permanent policy will surely result in complete loss of faith in our country all over the world. That will make the Muslim's integrity look good next to an American Government's system of looting money using a hoax.

“[I]n the same way that our view of our vulnerabilities and our foreign policy was shaped profoundly by 9/11, indelibly by 9/11,” Obama said. “I think this disaster is going to shape how we think about the environment and energy for many years to come."

9/11! 9/11! 9/11!

Thank you, you establishment Republicans! You gave the administration a 9/11 trump card that it can use whenever it wants.

Israel is in hot conflict; Iran is building nukes and verbally threatening its existence; North Korea has nukes and leadership that would give Commodous a run for his money...

Is Obama attending to those pressing issues, and to the oil that is still spilling, as the first priority? No, sadly no. Let's throw 9/11 out there and put some James Taylor on and get back to the fantastic liberal plan of remaking the world in our green image.

Think back to his big speech to a joint session of Congress in Feb 2009, supposedly about the recession and rising unemployment. His solution then: universal health care, gov't control of energy markets, and more money for education (i.e. teacher's unions).

Note that he got two out of three (sort of): ObamaCare and the $780 billion stimulus, a huge chunk of which went to the states to pay off the SEIU, NEA and friends.

The Queen - "You see why this is absolutely necessary, don't you? What if nothing is done and global warming... doesn't happen? What a disaster! But if disastrously extreme measures are taken and then global warming doesn't happen? What a great relief!"

I think he realizes anything that doesn't pass by November isn't going to pass. NPR has Republicans up over Democrats on the generic ballot by eight points, the most lopsided in that direction it has ever been.

Looks like the One is doubling down--let's see, the economy is in the crapper, the stimulus failed, his poll numbers are going down faster than Laurie David, he botched the BP mess--Eureka--let's try to shove another prohibitively expensive clusterfest of a climate bill that no will read right up the collective keister of the American people.

I'm surprised actually. With the red meat of science to chew on, the ultra-recht here shows up toothless.

You fellas are a laugh riot of ignorance and scientific waste. Tell ya' what. Find on bright bulb among you and he will be the one we try and teach..pick your smartest guy or gal...then we will go slow with him/her and see if some knowledge can seep into what appears now to be a wall of blockheads.

No wonder the world laughs at our common man's level of basic science.

I think you'll get your wish and one day Obama, terrible Obama, will be gone. And then, do you have any proposals whatsoever for the governance of the country or to address any of the problems that the country might have?

There is no problem with energy in this country? Oil consumption, regulation all hunky dory?

Kcom is on to something here--how to stave off Obama? We need Obama boom. It's clear that the emergency relief wells won't be finished until November. In the meantime, we've got to do a Jindal--deploy all the Obama boom you can and build those barrier islands.

You fellas are a laugh riot of ignorance and scientific waste. Tell ya' what. Find on bright bulb among you and he will be the one we try and teach..pick your smartest guy or gal...then we will go slow with him/her and see if some knowledge can seep into what appears now to be a wall of blockheads.

No wonder the world laughs at our common man's level of basic science.

If you really believe in that sort of elitism, then there really isn't any room left for democracy, is there?

What's funny is that cap and trade was a Republican idea. Now it's a "disastrously extreme measure", according to Althouse. From 1990 to 2008, acid rain emissions dropped in half, from Bush I did from the Clean Air Act amendments.

The actual common sense position against AGW is that it's unlikely that the earth, after aeons of huge changes and cycles, has suddenly developed an instability.

Since they can't solve the relevant physics equations (the Navier Stokes equations, at bottom), climate modellers pull an equation out of their asses that they can solve, and solve that instead.

Here the theory of evolution kicks in (we believe in evolution, right?): those models that predict doom get funding, and those that don't predict doom don't get funding but wind up in the punched card recycle bin and are not heard from again. So we get a population of doom-predicting models, which, for all their busy proponents, are based on climate hand-waving and curve-fitting.

Bayesian statistics strongly favor the evolution theory over the runaway instability theory, by several million to one. This aligns, unsurprisingly, with common sense.

Incidentally, mathematical fact, you can't tell a trend from a cycle with an amount of data that's short compared to the cycle; the point of the hockey stick was to get around that by showing explosive growth, but the hockey stick has met its demise in data hacking. So there's zero, zilch, evidence that if the earth is warming, that it's not a normal cycle.

And if a cycle, it can't be man-caused.

Politicians would like the control and the money, however. This is where lies come in, followed by bad ideas.

Well, not surprising. They *have* to try to pass it before November ... this is their last chance.

It is clear now that the administration's plan from the beginning was to shove through as much Big Government legislation and takeovers as possible, while they had their majority in the first two years ... however expensive, however unpopular those policies might be.

Then, to add insult to injury, they're all chickening out of the Townhalls. Disgusting.

I'd call you a sanctimonious twit, but I have too much respect for twits.

Shorter HD: Madly waves hands--"Pay no attention to our scientificaly illiterate CIC. The Army Corpse of Engineers has all 57 states well in hand. All is well. Oh, and I'll scientifically kick your asses once my Ivy League experts tell which ones."

If you don't believe in AGW, can't you at least be decent enough to allow that the policy makers who want to restrict carbon emissions are doing so out of a sincere belief that it will prevent something bad? Do you have to impute ridiculous, half-assed nefarious motives to it? Can someone go over why the LIBRULS and OBAMA want to destroy capitalism with a carbon tax? Who gains from that precisely? How does Obama make money off of it?

Freeman Hunt - Actually it's 1,000's of scientists who are saying we need to do something. The president is merely passing along the message...even to those of you who apparently never read anything before spouting off with the usual tea bagger drivel.

Maybe if you did read more and listened to Glenn Beck and Rush less...?

Not sure if this makes me a conspiracy theorist or not but I swear to God this man is trying to destroy this country. Mammoth debt, a crashing economy, no jobs to be found, and this moron wants to pass a bill that will only make all three of those things worse in order to stop something that doesn't even fucking exist?

And this is from somone who generally pulls the "Party Lever" every November there's an election.

But using your "logic" I'm glad you've come around to Tax Cuts for all, School Vouchers and support for the War in Iraq...ALSO GOP ideas. Or is it just ideas that LIBERALS like that have GOP origin you like?

HDHouse, so you're just going to stick your head in the sand or is it more Orwellian, those e-mails NEVER leaked...There is NO evidence of fraud...there is LOTS of evidence for warming (though it has been deleted)

What's funny is that cap and trade was a Republican idea. Now it's a "disastrously extreme measure", according to Althouse.

It's true. I was one of the early supporters of cap and trade, but have since soured on it.

The original idea was revenue neutral. It was supposed to be a way of rationalizing the externalities of fossil fuels, not a way to slip in a massive tax increase. But Obama was flogging this last year because it was the only way he could come up with to pay for health care.

The other problem is you can't actually implement a scheme like this without adding another huge layer of government bureaucracy. Forget the cost of the carbon permits - the cost of regulatory compliance will be enormous.

Since they can't solve the relevant physics equations (the Navier Stokes equations, at bottom),

Climate models do solve the Navier-Stokes equation. The difficulties come in approximating some of the forcing terms on the right hand side. (To put it mildly).

So there's zero, zilch, evidence that if the earth is warming, that it's not a normal cycle.

As I recall, from a seminar given here a year or so ago, it will take 60-100 years to determine whether or not recent increases in Atlantic Hurricane activity aren't an upwards trend in a cycle, but rather a baseline change.

"As I recall, from a seminar given here a year or so ago, it will take 60-100 years to determine whether or not recent increases in Atlantic Hurricane activity aren't an upwards trend in a cycle, but rather a baseline change. "

MM said.... If there's nothing in the bill to promote Nuclear Energy, then the bill is just farcical window dressing.

HDhoue said...You fellas are a laugh riot of ignorance and scientific waste.

MM said it best. Nukes are the only non-carbon energy source that is industrial strength.

Why?

power grids are all about base load. The mimimum load that is on the system 24/7. Something dependable has to be able to supply that load, 24/7/365. Then on top of that you have standby surge capacity, normally NG or out west Hydro, that you can turn on and off as needed.

Nuke is not efficent for surge, but is great for base load.

Neither Wind nor solar is dependable enough to supply serious base load bower nor is it available enough for the surge needs.

Wind and solar won't be useful, (and we arent even talking about the fact that they arent cost effective) until Chu and the lads at NREL and NETL invent a energy mass storage technology.

Want to talk about science and the problem HD? Beyond solar/wind's cost problem, you cant depend on them, and there is no cost effective, energy conserving mass storage device. Today, The best method, at 30% efficency is to use solar power to pump water uphill behind a Dam, so that when the sun don't shine, you can let it run down again thru a turbine.

Bottom line: This is another created crisis that Obama wants to use to rush the country down a path that will be hard to recover from.

Well Monty as ALGore stands to become the first Carbon Billionaire if Capn'Trade passes you'll understand that I am a bit suspicious of his altruism...

And so that's your argument, their motives are pure...so the Ukrainian Famine, the Purges, the Show Trials, Pol Pot, the Great Leap Forward, the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution...all good because the perpetrators had pure motives? Salem Witch Trials, all kewl...they had pure motives?

Joel Benenson, a pollster for the Democratic National Committee and Obama’s presidential campaign, argues in a new briefing for top Capitol Hill officials that a comprehensive energy bill “could give Democrats a potent weapon to wield against Republicans in the fall.”

@mm Climate models do solve the Navier-Stokes equation. The difficulties come in approximating some of the forcing terms on the right hand side.

Nobody comes close to solving the Navier Stokes equations in even simpified form over the globe. 3-D flows go to shorter scales and cannot be followed at any grid spacing whatsover.

On top of that, there are oceans with their completely unknown flows and boundary conditions, not only air with its mixed chemistry, that must be followed too.

It's so far out of the range of possibility that nobody seriously imagines trying it.

Or they do as a graduate student and become instantly wiser after doing a couple of small numerical experiments.

The forcing terms aren't the immediate problem with NS.

The pseudoscience problem is that modellers don't recognize when they're doing curve fitting, having left physics far behind. Agreement with data becomes meaningless once you have enough degrees of freedom in anything at all.

Another malformed inbred dead-bolt makes accusations of GW denial. Hey, dead-bolt, the world doesn't need to be saved. Furthermore, it doesn't need to be saved by the Mulatto-In-Chief. President Barely makes wonderful pontifications on things he thinks he knows, but you just embarrass yourself and your ideology even more when you start calling people deniers who simply don't embrace your Gaiaist nonsense. You are the gnat on the ass of life.

If you don't believe in AGW, can't you at least be decent enough to allow that the policy makers who want to restrict carbon emissions are doing so out of a sincere belief that it will prevent something bad?

It's not a question of decency. It's a question of what's right. When one side refuses to permit debate, it's fair to presume that they know that they lose.

Here's a gedanken experiment for you. What if global warming was a net benefit for mankind? How can you be certain that it isn't?

Do you have to impute ridiculous, half-assed nefarious motives to it?

It's not a question of imputing motives. If "they" are doing it for motives that are ridiculous, half-assed and nefarious, or because they are merely stupid, it's still wrong.

Can someone go over why the LIBRULS and OBAMA want to destroy capitalism with a carbon tax? Who gains from that precisely?

They get the power to pick and choose the winners and losers in American society, and I don't care to entrust them with that power. Richard Daley may make it work in Chicago, but people who don't want to play his games can always move to the suburbs or out of state. Leaving America for a place

How does Obama make money off of it?

He doesn't, at least not directly. His cronies on Wall Street make gazillions (even as he excoriates them) and they take care of him later.

Montaigne: Here's an idea. A ten dollar a gallon tax on gasoline and a one thousand dollar a year fee to use the roads. Five hundred dollar fines to those who have no permit, with the auto confiscated after the second ticket. Gas price to be raised ten percent per year until the per gallon price is 20 at which time the price is fixed.

I can live with this approach and think it would raise bicycle usage almost immediately. Less traffic, bluer skies, great work for the "planners" who want to put toy trains going every which way.

I don't see any reason why a draconian proposal such as this would be inappropriate for a draconian problem such as AGW. I would be all in with this program as it would reduce my already short commute to next to nothing.

Poor people clutter up the roads and generally drive suspiciously carbon positive vehicles.

The nice thing about this approach is that all the peoples get to help save the earth, not just "the rich."

I think you'll get your wish and one day Obama, terrible Obama, will be gone. And then, do you have any proposals whatsoever for the governance of the country or to address any of the problems that the country might have?

There is no problem with energy in this country? Oil consumption, regulation all hunky dory?

[sigh] Another dead-bolt adorns the commentariat with his witless attempts at snark. I have a plan in hand right now that illicits an energy plan for this country that will keep it at the forefront of generation and consumption.

1. Re-examine the NRC guidelines to account for new reactor types.

2. Once that's completed and sanctioned, begin the process of accepting applications from states, cities, municipalities to begin the transition to build new plants.

3. Begin building large amounts of MSR (molten salt reactors) that serve a dual purpose. The first being able to co-generate/store energy and the second being able to consume used/spent nuclear fuel.

You could literally build a business on emptying out Yucca Valley on MSR's alone.

4. Work with generation companies to help them rebuild their infrastructure as a function of accepting new NPP's at reduced costs, reduced permiting, and reduced time for approvals.

5. Begin a parallel/phased transition to a hydrogen infrastructure that can be co-generated by the dual use purposes of creating said hydrogen fuel at NPP's.

There is so much one can do if you actually put your mind to it without the dead-bolt mentality that block heads like you employ.

I just heard that the pres is going to get us some great green jobs. Like Spain. Splendid idea going green what with the wind and the rain being just outside our doors absolutely free for us all. Like Spain we can get free of foreign oil and create, create!!, jobs in the greenish style. The president is going to get the government to create, create, green jobs. What a man.

If you don't believe in AGW, can't you at least be decent enough to allow that the policy makers who want to restrict carbon emissions are doing so out of a sincere belief that it will prevent something bad?

Ignorance is bliss for you, no? Considering that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere alone only constitutes .036% that makes it a trace gas. Then the question that begs asking is, WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TRYING TO PREVENT? What I fail to see is any legislation on atmospheric water vapor mitigation. Ooops, can't make that happen can we unless you visqueen the entirety of all the oceans.

Do you have to impute ridiculous, half-assed nefarious motives to it? Can someone go over why the LIBRULS and OBAMA want to destroy capitalism with a carbon tax? Who gains from that precisely? How does Obama make money off of it?

They aren't nefarious because they are right out in the open about what they are trying to do. What in essence is happening is that this type of alarmist, chicken little legislation does is cost shift or lack of a better phrase, redistribute wealth as a method of further taxation from those who produce to those who don't. Namely government and as a function of further government control, but in this case of nearly everything you do and consume. It's the near perfect bureaucratic legislation at it's finest. Anything short of a dictatorial, Chavez style, socialist take-over of nearly all industry in the country basically trumps legislation like this.

This is a simplistic explanation because for you, anything more heady than this, you just don't have the brain power to process.

"If you don't believe in AGW, can't you at least be decent enough to allow that the policy makers who want to restrict carbon emissions are doing so out of a sincere belief that it will prevent something bad?"

I'm supposed to believe that Gore, Barry, Nancy, and Harry sincerely believe in AGW? Please, all they believe in is power and this is just another way to gain it.

"You children do realize of course that you are in the minority don't you?"

Checked out the polls lately? The majority are dubious at best and certainly do not want to crash our economy over it.

Wow the rightwing is touchy tonight. .. but they have a history of being deathly afraid of things they don't understand.

HDHouse, in a comparison between the airy, content-free, fact-free bloviations posted by you, MM, and Jeremy in this thread and the observations offered by, say, rhhardin, The Drill SGT, and Big Mike, it is certainly not the rightwing, that comes across as touchy, or deathly afraid, or as the ones who don't understand the issues and the science involved.

If you didn't mean your 5:24 post to be take as sarcasm, that would be the garage we all know and love. Well, know, anyway. And not in the Biblical sense.<

Of course. Global warming deniers are every bit, if not more funny, than global warming alarmists. Covert scientist temperature manipulated global conspiracies, kooky life controlling One World order stories..... I thought conservatives believe in market based solutions to clean up the environment, which cap and trade is. Knowing we cut acid rain emissions in half from cap and trade 20 yrs ago from what Bush I did, aren't you glad we did it? Or would you rather be breathing 8 million tons of additional sulfur dioxide every year and having it rained down on you? Did it drive all those companies out of business from capping those emissions?

How about this, since we are so into selective taxes for people, lets inact a tax on the celebrities and liberals? The tax would be used to combat global warming. In other words, put your money where your mouth is. I wonder how long the concept of AGW would last?

Looks like the AGW kool-aid drinkers are showing up just as the science is looking most dubious. How does it feel to be such a chump?

Oh, I may not be a "climate scientist" but I am a professional computer programmer. The "Harry Read Me" file leaked with the ClimateGate emails is enough to completely and permanently discredit the climate modelers' programming efforts. That part is irrefutable. You can try to spin the emails but you can't spin the code.

Althouse wrote: You see why this is absolutely necessary, don't you? What if nothing is done and global warming... doesn't happen? What a disaster! But if disastrously extreme measures are taken and then global warming doesn't happen? What a great relief! It will be impossible to tell whether the solution worked or whether global warming just wasn't going to happen anyway. Win-win!

I'm reposting part of a comment I made last October here which I think makes exactly that same point.

3) What really bothers me as a sceptic of the CO2 causes warming is that if the Copenhagen treaty is ratified and enforced, and warming does not occur, credit will be taken regardless of the true cause. To me this is a heads I win tails you lose proposition for the CO2 causes warming folks. But more insidiously, it is the exact mechanism by which Science could ascend to the status of a quasi-religion: give the people "miracle, mystery and authority" and they will follow.

well I guess hydrogen is something you could make using solar or wind. :)

The nukes? I'd keep them working base load.

You could use solar/wind to do that. However, the intrinsic inefficiencies of say wind alone would make that a total net loser. Solar is getting better, but until a truly full spectrum PV in the 70%+ range is created, then you still have a better net loser. However, considering the toxic nature of creating PV's overall, I don't think most envirokooks would go for it.

Besides, most envirokooks don't have a clue on what it takes to get things made and how things are actually made and with the processes and materials required to make them would make them shudder in Gaiaist rage.

Of course. Global warming deniers are every bit, if not more funny, than global warming alarmists. Covert scientist temperature manipulated global conspiracies, kooky life controlling One World order stories..... I thought conservatives believe in market based solutions to clean up the environment, which cap and trade is. Knowing we cut acid rain emissions in half from cap and trade 20 yrs ago from what Bush I did, aren't you glad we did it? Or would you rather be breathing 8 million tons of additional sulfur dioxide every year and having it rained down on you? Did it drive all those companies out of business from capping those emissions?

I read this disastrous piece of textual offal and the first thought that came into my mind was how spectacularly stupid you really are and then the second thought was why touchdown Jesus got hit by lightning and not you. Now I know why dunce cap companies still stay in business and it's because you are their biggest customer. You are a moron. A real, honest to goodness retard moron.

True story: An oil executive and a Sierra Club lobbyists have been haggling during backroom negotiations in Washington. During a break they shoot the breeze. Sierra Club says, "Our long term goal, of course, is to ban the use of fossil fuels."

Garage....Why would an honest man compare scrubbers of sulfer dioxide emissions on coal electrical generation plants in the 1980s to minescule and meaningless CO2 emissions from thousands of accused sources. Did you recieve Grant money too? It is a huge hoax trying to be resurrected by pretend stories like yours. Take some responsability and admit that it was all a hoax, and be like most tacit warmist scientists that are suddenly going back and covering their tracks now.

can't you at least be decent enough to allow that the policy makers who want to restrict carbon emissions are doing so out of a sincere belief that it will prevent something bad?

No. I doubt there are more than two dozen members of congress that understand any science, let alone atmospheric science. They certainly don't understand basic economics and struggle with the plain meaning of the US Constitution.

This isn't about science; it's about power and congress seeing a new revenue stream to satisfy their insatiable lust for spending.

We have 120 or so years of temperature observations on which the concept of global warming is based. I've looked at how these temps are measured and recorded and would not trust them to within +/- 2 degrees or so.

Problems affecting accuracy and/or precision include:

1) Almost all sites have been moved at least once, many multiple times, over the years. Even movements of a few hundred feet can make big changes to temperatures at the station.

2) The majority of stations have not been in continuous existence. Some have been dropped, others added. See comment in #1 above.

3)Different arithmetical methods of calculating the average temperature at a station have been used for different stations and even for the same station at different times. For example, averaging the max and min temp will give a different result from averaging 24 hourly readings. While the two methods will yield similar results, they will not be identical.

4) Many readings have relied on an untrained person looking at a thermometer that reads in 2 degree increments and noting the temp. They may do this at varying times, they may not read it closely. Or, they may read it at all, simply writing in a number that looks right.

5) Sites that were correctly located 50 years ago are now in the middle of parking lots, under AC exhausts and other heat sources

6) There are more reasons for inaccuracy, just ask if you want me to go on.

The end result is that the data is not accurate to more than 2 degrees or so.

From this the "scientists", who we are now finding may not really exist claim that they can detect a temperature rise of less than 0.001 degrees/yr or about 0.8 degrees over more than 100 years.

I call BS. If the data is only accurate to +/- 2 degrees or so, we don't have any idea whether temps are going up or down.

There may be global warming. But based on the data that IPCC works from, it is just as likely there is global cooling.

The end result is that the data is not accurate to more than 2 degrees or so.

I am not sure if it is even that close. And what is really scary, is that the "scientists" involved probably don't either. At least 4 of the 5 primary climatic data bases are suspect due to the CRU problems. The scientists involved don't appear to be able to replicate their databases based on the raw temperature data (which is, as you point out, often fairly inaccurate). Part of that inability to replicate appears to be that when temperate data was "cleaned up", the reason for the adjustments made, the selection of which raw data to use, how to adjust it, etc., has apparently been lost. What we do know is that some of those adjustments, interpolations, etc. just don't make sense, at least not yet.

There may be global warming. But based on the data that IPCC works from, it is just as likely there is global cooling.

There is just no way to ever know.

What is a bit scary is that the same "scientists" who were caught red handed over the last year fudging data, manipulating the peer review process, etc., were key players in the IPCC reports, AND, it turns out that much of the IPCC material was not peer reviewed (even if you assumed that that was some sort of guarantee of accuracy, which we can't in this case). Indeed, much was apparently the work of climatic advocacy groups.

If that doesn't scare you, it turns out that the EPA has used the fatally flawed IPCC reports to justify regulation of CO2. Because of the supposed urgency of AGW, they didn't do any of their own research, as was required by law, but primarily depended on the politically controlled and managed IPCC reports.

The end result is that the data is not accurate to more than 2 degrees or so.

I am not sure if it is even that close. And what is really scary, is that the "scientists" involved probably don't either. At least 4 of the 5 primary climatic data bases are suspect due to the CRU problems. The scientists involved don't appear to be able to replicate their databases based on the raw temperature data (which is, as you point out, often fairly inaccurate). Part of that inability to replicate appears to be that when temperate data was "cleaned up", the reason for the adjustments made, the selection of which raw data to use, how to adjust it, etc., has apparently been lost. What we do know is that some of those adjustments, interpolations, etc. just don't make sense, at least not yet.

In short, basic science wasn't even observed. The conclusions from that alone are self-fulfilling.

In short, basic science wasn't even observed. The conclusions from that alone are self-fulfilling.

The problem is not really the bad basic science so much as bad basic math. Those guys were what passes for Climate scientists. What they were NOT is statisticians. Nor scientific programmers. They made fundemental errors in the statistics, the sampling, the data scrubbing, the corrections and even violated the most basic rules that when you combine measurements with varying degrees of accuracy, the result must be considered to carry the accuracy of the worst input.

I am not sure it is as close as +/-2 degrees either. I am confident that it is no closer than that and may be much worse.

NOAA classifies temperature stations in the US 1-5. depending on the amount extraneous heat they get from sun, parking lots, other heat sources. A class 5 may read as much as 5 deg more than the real temperature. Class 4 is, IIRC, +3deg, Class 3+2 deg and class 2 +1 degree. (I'm going from memory but can provide the NOAA link if asked)

Only something like 10-15% of all US stations are rated, by NOAA, as class 2 or better.

FWIW: I am personally responsible for some of the bad sea temperature data. Much of the sea temp data comes from Navy logbooks. As a messenger of the watch back in the day I would be the one to take the incoming seawater temp at the main condenser. The thermometer read in 2 degree increments. It was not calibrated, AFAIK, while I was on the ship. When I read it, I didn't take any great pains to do so precisely. We were mainly interested in whether the water was warm or cool as it had an effect on how the turbines ran.

I would say +/- 2 to 4 degree accuracy but I would not guarantee it.

Statute of limitations having passed, I can also confess that sometimes I did not even take the hourly readings. I would simply repeat the last hour's reading with a bit of variation to make it look authentic.

As for glaciers, sea ice and so on, yes, some of it is melting. But some of it is increasing. Seems like normal variation to me.

So, yeah. I stand by my statement that there is as much evidence of global cooling as warming. I don't think it is possible to have any idea whether either is taking place. Certainly not from the data.

I would also question the entire concept of a single global temperature such as global warming relies on. But that is a whole 'nother discussion.

If you don't believe in AGW, can't you at least be decent enough to allow that the policy makers who want to restrict carbon emissions are doing so out of a sincere belief that it will prevent something bad?

If the people in question honestly do believe that it is necessary to lower carbon emissions to prevent something bad, why do they knowingly produce vastly more carbon emissions than normal Americans?

As I see it there are two explanations:

(1): They don't really believe carbon emissions are bad.

(2): They believe that global warming is bad, just not AS bad as the thought of them having to live like ordinary people instead of modern-day royalty. Sure, polar ice caps melting is bad, but flying COACH is truly horrifying.

Hydrogen sucks as an energy storage medium. It is too diffuse and too difficult to store. Electrical synthesis of methane would be better IMO. The main component of natural gas, we already have vast infrastructure in place to transport and consume it directly.

Drilling began in February of this year. The rig blew up two months later.

Let's pretend you're right, and that Bush repealed regulations that would have prevented the explosion. The best thing you can say about Obama is that he is so incompetent at his job that, in the twelve months since taking office, he couldn't pry himself away from the golf course long enough to get the old, "good" regulations reinstated.

You lot have gotten too used to blaming Bush for everything. What you don't realize is that while blaming Bush for something the government can't obviously and immediately fix (e.g., the economy) can play well with the public, blaming Bush for the Democratic Party's failure to pass regulations during a year of complete control of the government does NOT play well with the public. It makes you look like a pack of giant idiots, in fact.

HD House: You "understand global warming" do you? And that's all you have to say , science wise, is that you understand it? Not even a little tour through the internets to refute John and Bruce who are asking for refutation? You "understand global warming." Priceless.

When I was a science editor in the 70s, the climate model was that we would soon be exiting a 60-yr period of the most ideal weather in the entire Holocene and returning to a *more normal* pattern of hotter and cooler summers, warmer and colder winters--precisely what we are seeing now. Can't we at least have someone explain how what we are seeing is not the long-predicted normal weather before trashing our economy?

Global warming is bollocks. The Navier Stokes equations, which describe the movement of the atmosphere, are nonlinear. Edward Lorenz back in the 1960s showed that the non-linearity means weather (and hence, climate) can not be predicted long term, and the average temperature is meaningless. Weather and climate show sensitive dependence on initial conditions. In the desert, temperature fluctuates at least 20 degrees per day, and often as much as 40 degrees. Researchers who pretend to discover and report average temperature changes of 1 or 2 degrees are charlatans.

Then there's the recent National Academy of Sciences report on global warming:

" A strong, credible body of scientific evidence shows that climate change is occurring, is caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for a broad range of human and natural systems….

Some scientific conclusions or theories have been so thoroughly examined and tested, and supported by so many independent observations and results, that their likelihood of subsequently being found to be wrong is vanishingly small. Such conclusions and theories are then regarded as settled facts. This is the case for the conclusions that the Earth system is warming and that much of this warming is very likely due to human activities."

HD House: you understand it--what the science behind it? Lets see--you were a musician and then an ad man--precisely what is your background in research methodology or even more generally things like thermodynamics or other relevant topics--somehow I don't think science, research methodology, or other such topics are your strong suit. But feel free to enlighten us with your Cal Tech or MIT background.

Madison Man: at the risk of being a bit facetious, I would suggest glaciers have been shrinking for the last 40K years if you take as a baseline 40K BC. Our planet, as I know you are fully aware, has seen tremendous atmospheric and geological change long before our puny species ever evolved.

I would also suggest, re the various models being propounded, the gold standard to research is replication. If the models can't be replicated then you have shit--much like professor Pons and cold fusion. Anyone who denies the importance of replication is at best scientifically ignorant.

Mad Man--and I am in full agreement with your position on nuclear power in your initial post--well said. Even the godless, cheese eating surrender monkeys the french are doing quite nicely with it. (OK, a bit hyperbolic--some of my best friends are french, french sommaliers notwithstanding.)

Roger J. said... HD House: yI don't think science, research methodology, or other such topics are your strong suit. But feel free to enlighten us with your Cal Tech or MIT background."

Sure Roger. the Fyneman course in physics at CalTech, 9 patents in medical technology, actually teaching research methods and procedures at the doctoral level at 2 universities, 10 years advising the Soviet Academy of Science in marketing their inventions and procedures, a nomination from NASA for the Rolex Award for Science and the Humanities..oh and the first American to be named to the All USSR Society of Science, Medicine and Technology....there is some other stuff Roger but I'm sure you are bored to death right now....just about the same way I am bored with you.

So HD House: with such stering credentials as those, why are you in advertising when you could be a major force in science? enlighten me please. And trust me, I find you as boring and trite as you find me. So its really a wash isnt it.

Because I'm better in advertising than in science and generally we don't have to put up with putzy pseudo scientists who bring either their politics or their religion into the debate?

comprende? sprechen sie english?

I find it particularly galling that basic science is shoved aside because it is something that you or others on here 'just don't like' so you trump up crap science put forth by a minority and cling to it like a wet diaper.

Science isn't just something to dabble in when religion becomes boring and you can fit into your daily prayers or political Fauxnoise just some of the science that won't cause a wave in your pond. If you have traveled and talked to scientists who had a government control them and yet, in spite of ruination and potential retribution you can only imagine they stood firm and held on to their values and didn't sell them out to either score points or get that coveted FauxNoise guest spot.

I really don't have a lot of use political types who trot out the "unsettled science" garbage when caught in the hard spot between truth and a lie and I particularly have no respect whatsoever for those who are in science and support the completely unsupportable. You my friend should be ashamed.

House: what the hell are you talking about? yes I comprende, and I speak english--I did search on the list of patent holders in medicine, and I found one person who matches your name and who lived in Tulsa Oklahoma. Here's the search link: http://www.patentgenius.com/subpage.php?page=inventor&last=House&first=h&search=Search

You could cut the bullshit and list your patent numbers, and if you have them I will apologize for my doubt aboutyour credentials forthwith.

HD House--your previous comment was not worth commenting on--I dont own a TV, do not listen to radio, and since I dont own a TV cannot watch Fox News--Now if you would click on my blogger name, you will find my contact information. And seriously, I will look forward to reading your work. Frankly I think you are full of shit, but you could surprise me and if so I will be the first to take back my comments.

Edward Lorenz back in the 1960s showed that the non-linearity means weather (and hence, climate) can not be predicted long term, and the average temperature is meaningless. Weather and climate show sensitive dependence on initial conditions.

You display some ignorance in the understanding of weather predictability vs. climate predictability. The fact that weather cannot be predicted 3 weeks in advance (sometimes, 2-week forecasts have some accuracy -- the trick is knowing when the particular weather regime you're in is predictable -- I've never actually looked at 3-week forecasts) means absolutely nothing with respect to climate forecasts. Is the climate influenced by the fact that the big storm will be 2 weeks from tomorrow vs. 2 weeks and 2 days? Nope. If the storm tracks are consistent with observations, and temperatures are consistent with observations, then that's a first step in validating your climate model.

I'm not saying Climate Models offer much good output -- but your reasoning for disbelieving them is misguided.

Trooper: of course he is--and could you 'splain to Mr House, that trooper york was a character in the Cavalry Triology? That seems to be beyond his attention span. Now my favorite character was Victor McGlaughan and and follwed by Ward Bond--true cavalrymen

Ben Johnson played the same character in all of the movies with variations on the same name.

He was a former stuntman who did most of his own stunts.

Personally I thought Henry Fonda was great playing the Custer role.Stiff. Infexiable. Arrogant. Wordy. No concept of what was going on. Reminds me of a certain president who is currently leading us to disaster.

Trooper: you will note that the estimable Mr House is not very good at answering Yes or No questions.--since he has volunteered to provide me his abstracts (and with any luck the nine patents that he holds) I will withold any further judgment. But if in fact he has done what he has said he had done, I will apologize to him on this forum, don sack cloth and ashes etc.

I love all of John Fords movies especially the trilogy but you could never go wrong with any of his films.

In fact when I was thinking of a screen name I thought I would use the assumed name that the Duke used in the Quiet Man. In the movie he was a boxer who went under the name "Trooper Thorne" as his real name was Shawn Thorton. But I misremember it as Trooper York which was never his name in Rio Grande as he was a colonel. But by the time I had realized my mistake I had been posting for weeks so I decided to stick with it.

You know, given that some conservatives, such as the Republican nominee for Governor in Nevada, still think flouride in water is a big problem, it's probably futile to try to reason anymore with conservatives on issues of science.

Anti-intellectualism is a core principle of modern conservatism, even as our world relies more on science and advanced technology and becomes increasingly complex.

Conservatives anymore seem to just hate science and to actively undermine it. Take their opposition to stem cell research, to dealing with ozone depletion, against evolution (heh), Bush-Cheney censoring scientific reports on climate change, etc, etc.

We can't prosper - or likely survive in recognizable form - as a country if we descend into this maelstrom of ignorance.

But the lesson to me is that these opponents and skeptics of science and intellectualism, probably including Althouse, are beyond reason.

Alfonso Bedoya played what the called the "bad tooth" Mexican in the Treasure of Sierra Madre. As opposed to the "good tooth" Mexican like Ricardo Montalbán or Gilbert Roland.

But my favor Mexican actor of the era was Pedro Armendáriz who played several roles in Fords movies including as Captian Yorks trusted sidekick in Fort Apache and as one of the "3 Godfathers." A huge star in Mexico he played a diginified and trustworthy friend to the Duke in many films and was one of the few positive portrayals of Mexicans in the movies to this very day.

As a side note, the Duke loved Latin woman and only married them. Ask Vicki from Pasedena about that sometime.

HD House: Would you go to an ad man for the truth? Can there be another business so devoted to distortion than advertising? Is there another "profession" as filled with failed writers and bitter non-artists who talk themselves into believing cynicism is the same thing as intelligence? Is there another brilliant scientist on the planet who forsook physics for advertising?

One of the things I have observed about liars is that they frequently give just a little bit more than is asked for, just a tad more specificity than is required. Which was a winning technique before the internets.

Alpha: I would suggest that indeed political judgments play a role in "science." But to assert the conservatives are "anti intellectual" is just plain bull shit. Science is a process in which reputable scientists publish their findings, provide their supporting documentation, and then have it peer reviewed so other scientists can replicate their findings. It is the replication of data that leads to more precise findings. The process does not depend on one's political orientation.

True that, MadMan. My point is that there doesn't seem to be any significant pattern. I sit on a tractor without a cab when I plow snow. Sometimes I plow a lot, sometimes hardly ever. Same with extreme cold, and other years it's not too bad.

Ok--since I have nothing to do today except (a la the Clint Eastwood character in Grand torino) chase kids and dogs off my lawn, let me return to my morning project of jabbing HD House.

So know we know he really does not have a degree in physics from Cal Tech--I await his correspondence with his patent numbers (at this point rather rejected by the patent office's data base of patent holders), and his abstracts of his publications. I will report forthwith when I recieve them.

Alpha--I do public health and flouride in water is a major plus--and guess what. I am a reublican conservative and libertarian--Republicans making political issues of science are no different than democrats making issues of science to further their political ends.

Good oral health can be achieved by flouridation, and getting dental hygeiests out from under the thumb of the dentists lobby.

Fouridataion, coupled with inexpensive tooth care by qualified hygienests can eliminate most cavities and dental problems--except that cuts into the bottom line of dentists.

AlphaliberalRepublicans hate and attack (junk) science. They think flouride is a threat (in my wild imagination confusing Republicans with the John Birch society...they are the same thing right.) Why in the world should we care what these know nothings think about global warming?(we just have to lie and cook the books so we can take over the economy and destroy the capitialist system).

Trooper York said... "Obama is totally blowing the clean up on the Gulf worse then Bush did with Katrina .."

Mark the minute Trooper...I agree with you. I don't think they are the same thing as Katrina didn't just keep hitting New Orleans but I do agree with you that Obama had nothing to offer last night and has not effectively taken charge of this mess. It is his to do and he isn't doing it.

The speech should never have been given and won't vote for him again as a result of his lack of handling of this unless he turns it around and pronto...we'll see how he does with BP today...but right now you are right and I agree.

I must say I really respect you for saying that. Anyone with an ounce of intergity would have to agree with you. The clean up and ending this spill is a totally seperate issue. The only way to get him to move if for his supporters like you to get him to put the full resources of the government to bear in what is a totally legitmate use of such power. If BP was negligent (which I have no doubt they were) they should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. But we have to get moving to protect the wetlands the economic life of Lousiana.

You know, HD--if you would drop some of your insufferable bullshit we just might agree on a hell of a lot more. Its Ok to disagree on policy; God knows that there are lots of policy choices out there. Its OK not to like certain politicians, but from what I have seen you tend to step up the rhetoric a bit more than is justified.

Frankly I don't expect you send me anything on my email addy--If you do, I will review them, and give you credit where credit is due.

And if you want to know something about me, google my name--available on the blog addy. I got nothing to hide .